


i do it just to feel like i'm alive

by notthebigspoon



Category: American Idol RPF, Neal Tiemann (Musician)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-23
Updated: 2013-03-23
Packaged: 2017-12-06 04:37:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/731505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notthebigspoon/pseuds/notthebigspoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s the worst of the worst in society and he feels right at home.</p><p>Title taken from Bottom of a Bottle by Smile Empty Soul.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i do it just to feel like i'm alive

Neal rarely stays at the same hotel as the rest of the band. He chooses cheap flea traps where he can pay cash and not leave a name. He hears hookers and drug dealers at work, has heard gun shots more than once. It’s the worst of the worst in society and he feels right at home. He’ll turn up a bottle of JD and stare at the ceiling, wondering what he’s doing with his life and why he even bothers these days. Why does he work so hard to impress someone who is probably never coming back? Not coming back to Neal anyway.

He keeps his friends are arms length. He doesn’t need to hear about how he’s worth more and owes himself better. He doesn’t care. He just wants to wallow in his own filth and self loathing because it’s been a year, a year without a letter or a phone call or an email. A year of no news at all. A year of going to bed alone and remembering that he wasn’t good enough. It had all been a lie. Every kiss, every touch, ever ‘I love you’ was one big lie.

In the mornings he’ll stumble out of the motel and turn his key in at the office. He meets up with the band and avoids the curious looks and the questions about where he goes at night. He checks his phone hopefully and feels the same sagging disappointment that he feels every morning. He doesn’t know why he bothers anymore. Nothing seems to mean anything. The only time the hurt goes away is if he’s drinking or he’s on stage.

When Cook drops in on an HoH show, Neal scowls and pushes him away. He doesn’t want this shit, doesn’t need it, and he tells him so.

“Look, Neal, I miss him too. And I know it hurts, him just leaving the way that he did. But you knew from the start how things with Archie would be.” Cook sighs, squeezing his shoulder.

“And I was stupid enough to think I could change his mind.” Neal answers bitterly. “But I didn’t. And he left anyway. No calls, no letters, no emails, nothing. Two years together down the fucking drain.”

“You’ve wasted a year over him, Neal. Do you know what it’d do to him to see you like this? He’d hate it. And he’d hate himself. What did you tell me that time you two were fighting and nearly broke up?”

Neal closes his eyes. “That I never want to be the reason Archie is sad.”

“You like this would make him sad.” David says gently. “You’ve had a year to mourn. It’s time to move on. Forget Archie and just move on.”

Neal wishes it was that easy. He wishes he didn’t still have an engagement ring hidden in one of his guitar cases. But he does have that ring and this is never going to be easy, he’s never going to move on. But he smiles blandly and tells the lie that is expected of him. He leans into Cook and takes pictures and hides in the bottom of a bottle like it seems like he has every night for the past year.


End file.
